Movie Industry

Welcome to Hollywood, Overture Films. The new movie studio knew that its first release -- "Mad Money," a comedy starring Diane Keaton, Queen Latifah and Katie Holmes as unlikely robbers -- would face one monster when it opens Jan. 18: the creature feature "Cloverfield" from Paramount Pictures, whose Internet buzz is growing. Now it may face a scarier one: 20th Century Fox said Thursday that it was moving its romantic comedy "27 Dresses" back by a week to the same opening date.

Reactions to Academy Award nominations announced Tuesday became an intricate mix of hope and despair, as the usual feelings of joyful gratitude clashed with continuing fears about the nearly 3-month-old writers strike that has shaken Hollywood to its core.

A Florida company won the rights to Axium International Inc.'s staffing subsidiary at a federal bankruptcy auction Wednesday, two weeks after the Hollywood payroll service provider abruptly folded. MPS Group Inc., a provider of staffing and consulting services, won the auction after its bid of $8.075 million was approved by a bankruptcy judge during a three-hour proceeding in downtown Los Angeles. The publicly traded Jacksonville, Fla.

Hewlett-Packard Co. plans to announce today that it has signed an agreement with Sony Pictures Home Entertainment to create made-to-order DVDs of some of the studio's movies and TV shows. The agreement, whose terms were not disclosed, boosts Palo Alto-based HP's ambition to play the middleman in the future of how entertainment is distributed.

Thousands of Southern Californians were no doubt clutching their seats while watching "Cloverfield," last weekend's No. 1 movie at the box office. At least a few of them were clutching their stomachs as well. Since the movie opened last Friday, some patrons said they experienced nausea and dizziness while watching the horror flick, much of which was filmed with a herky-jerky, hand-held cameras.

Tuesday morning, National Geographic Cinema Ventures, the company releasing the rock concert movie "U2 3D," said it was moving up the picture's expansion to hundreds of theaters by one day to Valentine's Day -- "in keeping with the universe-as-one theme that U2 so wonderfully focuses on." Oops. Four hours later the distributor backed off. Because of a "programming conflict," it would wait to go wider until Feb. 15, as originally planned. The conflict was simple: Exhibitors expect Walt Disney Co.'

Battles between authors and studios over "Hollywood accounting" are nasty, and almost never resolved in favor of the writer. Ernest Hemingway once noted that authors should drive up to the California border and throw their books over a fence while studio officials throw bags of money back over the fence. That, he said, should be the end of the transaction. Some of the biggest names in publishing, however, have ignored this advice.

Walt Disney Co. has reached a deal to more than double its stake in Indian TV and movie content maker UTV, the two firms said, underscoring the U.S. entertainment firm's efforts to expand globally. Disney will raise its holding in UTV Software Communications Ltd. to 32.1%, the same level as UTV's founders, from 14.9%, by acquiring 9.35 million shares for 8.05 billion rupees ($203 million).